I had the most wonderful weekend from Friday till Sunday afternoon stamping in the Hunter Valley at our Annual Team Stamp Camp. It was hosted by our lovely team leader, Marelle Taylor. Not only was the company fabulous but the weather (apart from the wind on Friday) was just beautiful compared to last year. Gloriously sunny all weekend. Not that we really saw a lot of it when we were stamping and creating up a storm in the hall and we didn’t head to bed until the wee hours of the following mornings….lol. Then again Stamp Camps aren’t for sleeping and being outdoors anyway, are they??
My good friend Julie Price came along with me again this year. Julie and I decided we’d work on some tutorials together this year that we’d recently purchased from Jenny Moors, a very talented UK demonstrator. I almost completed 3 full tutorials along with a tutorial by Brenda Quintana for an advent calendar. I made the advent box and just have to wait on some new pre-order goodies to finish the final decorating and presentation stage.
So, would you like to see what I created??
First up I decided I’d make one of Jenny Moors 3D Pleated Christmas Trees.
I love how this turned out. I’ve used the new Christmas DSP that will be in the 2012 – 2013 Catalogue ‘Be Of Good Cheer’ commencing 1st September.
Jenny has made her tutorial using 2 different shades of greens (Lucky Limeade and Pear Pizzazz) which still looks lovely but as Pear Pizzazz will retire here on 31st August I opted to use the new incoming DSP so I could show it at workshops for the remainder of the year. If you decide to go over and purchase Jenny’s tutorial (they are very well priced) before going ahead and cutting make sure you decide on your DSP and work out how you’ll need to cut it to get your layout right. I opted to use 4 different patterns from my DSP pack so instead of scoring all the sheets at once I cut first (2 of each size strip) working my way in order of how I wanted my dsp to show. I’ll definitely be making more of these and will sit and work out which size pieces I need from what DSP print so I can hopefully score full sheets and then cut as this will make it so much quicker than the way I made this one.
There are a few little things I still want to finish with this one so I’m happier with my end result but it still won me a Silver Medal in the Christmas Challenge for the weekend.
Julie made hers using not traditional DSP in blues and browns. I’m not sure if or when Julie will be posting hers up on her blog as I’m sure she still wants to play with final touches on hers too but you can always go check out her other wonderful creations as she’s a wiz with Copic Markers.
Next up we both decided to work on Advent Calendars. Julie was making Jenny Moors version but again as there were quite a few things on that one that will be leaving us on 31st August I wanted to make something that will be current (well it will be in 2 weeks anyway). As I went to Convention back in May and attended the additional Friday night class I had a new Christmas Stamp set to be released in the upcoming catty called 25 & Counting. This set is perfect for an Advent Calendar. Actually I was hoping to make an Advent Calendar at the class but it turned out to be Advent Boxes (25 of them) which would have been difficult to display or carry around to workshops so I spent the time chatting to other fellow demos instead and just cut out the pieces I’d need if I wanted to make it up later at home.
Last Thursday I decided to Google the 25 & Counting stamp set and check out the images for what others had created with it. Guess what? I found the perfect tutorial for exactly what I wanted, made by a fellow Australian Demonstrator called Brenda Quintana and even better it was FREE. Brenda has created a tutorial in her post and also a Video Tutorial too. You can find Brenda’s tutorial here if you didn’t already click the link above.
This is where I’m at with the Advent Calendar so far. I guess you could leave it like this but I’m actually thinking of mounting it to a small canvas panel (something just a little bigger than this) and decorating around it a little with some new DSP and stamped images. I’m sure once I’ve finished it I’ll be asked to make at least another 3 so all my girls can have their own. The main base of this is made from 1 sheet of 12 x 12 cardstock just scored and folded a particular way (you can go over to Brenda’s site to see exactly how it’s made) so the final measurement is 14.5cm x 14.5cm. Knowing I might have to make 4 of these I wanted something reasonably small and compact so storing when not in use isn’t a big issue.
Colours I’ve used are Gumball Green (incoming In Colour 2012 – 2014), Cherry Cobbler, Marina Mist and Early Espresso. I’ve stamped onto Very Vanilla. I’ve used this combination so I can use the new ‘Be of Good Cheer’ DSP. The colours in that paper are Very Vanilla, Cherry Cobbler and Gumball Green. I’ve used the colour coach to select Marina Mist and I decided Early Espresso would be nicer than Basic Black.
Onto Project No. 3. This was Jenny Moors Forever Young Stamp Class. I wish I had of discovered Jenny’s site months ago rather than just before the coordinating Timeless Portrait DSP was about to retire. At least I’ve now used up some more of my paper collection and won’t have as much hanging around after 31st August so I guess that’s better than not discovering Jenny’s site till I’d sold off my DSP and then couldn’t recreate this set.
Isn’t this gorgeous.
There are 6 cards to the set and a covered Journal. I had some of the old larger size Journals than what Jenny has used so we had to alter that tutorial a little. This could even be split into 2 sets by creating another Journal using the Cherry Cobbler print that was used on the cards.
I haven’t taken individual close ups of the cards as I put them in my cubby holes on display and then realised I hadn’t photographed them yet so just did it from the cubby hole.
If this inspires you and you’d like to make a set too (even if you’d just like to make the cards) then pop over to Jenny Moors site and purchase the tutorial.
Project No. 4 we worked on was Jenny’s Bordering On Romance No. 2 Class. The colours in this are just gorgeous and not colours I might have considered putting together. I’ve only completed the 4 cards in this tutorial (with a few minor changes) as I forgot to read the instructions for the Gift Bag and therefore I didn’t have a bag to cover. I’ll finish that up in the next few days when I find/locate the correct size bag or make up something of my own.
The minor changes we made on these cards was that we used Watercolour Paper, an Aqua Painter and inkpads to colour the images. Generally the only time I use my Stampin’ Write Markers is for Direct to Stamp techniques not actual colouring in. These cards are a little more difficult to see in the cubby hole so I’ll snap some individual close ups in the next few days and share them with you. Maybe you would have already visited Jenny’s site before then and have your own copy of the tutorials. For the small price Jenny charges they are wonderful. You don’t need to think about cardstock sizes as it’s all there and Jenny provides both Metric and Imperial cutting measurements with her tutorials so if you prefer to work with one over the other then they are still both there for you to choose from.
On top of these 4 projects that I worked on over the weekend we also had 10 people create shoebox swaps, so I made 9 of those too. The 10th one was mine so I didn’t need to make that again.
Here is my Shoebox Swap using a sneak peek set called ‘Make A Cake’.
I designed my card to be quick and simple. Something that could be used as a workshop Make & Take. I didn’t use a Stamp-a-ma-jig for my cake layer positioning but you could and would probably make it easier especially for new stampers.
Supplies:
Stamp sets: Make A Cake, Bring on the Cake
Card: Baja Breeze, Primrose Petals, Whisper White, So Saffron Patterns DSP (Subtles Pack)
Ink: Stampin’ Write Markers – Baja Breeze, So Saffron, Primrose Petals
Accessories: 1 1/4” Square Punch.
I won’t share the other Shoebox swaps (not just yet anyway) as I can’t recall who created what and would like to give credit to the right person.
After such a fabulously crafty weekend I’m hoping my mojo has returned along with a desire to create. I have more new goodies arriving tomorrow and hope to get lots of crafting done this week.
Till next time….
